Nothing brings ‘em in like a good sermon title You can have “prophecy made simple” every night for 10 days at the 7th Day Adventist Church this week…or you get “intro to the 10 Commandments.”
Tension b/w controversy over the 10C’s being removed from the public square. Romans 6:14 fashion declare “we’re not under law but under grace” (rightly)
But what does that look like? What, if any, is the place of the law in our lives?
The Law is WHOLE
Like Russian Nesting Dolls ALL that God commands Heart of OT law are the Writings of Moses (first 5 books) Torah: “teaching/instruction” At the heart of Torah is the Ten Commandments Decalogue: 10 Words… Ex 34:28
10Cs is actually the first written covenant document Frame: The seed out of which grow the entire Scriptures
Not merely a Spiritual “To Do” list … 613 OT laws The Constitution of the people of God Every command somehow relates back to it
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Each of the 10 Cs are like the lunch special at Schooners: you get Two Sides … what NOT TO DO also informs us what TO DO When stated in the positive, the opposite is true
Do not murder also means, promote life Do not steal also means give generously!
We are to not wrong our neighbor, and at the same time serve to RIGHT our neighbor
Each of the 10 Cs points to all the others
Kite Runner: Amir asks his father (Baba) what he thinks about “sin”
“There is only one sin, and that is theft. All others are a variation of that one” When you murder, you steal someone’s life, you steal his wife’s right to a husband, rob his children of a father. When you lie, you steal someone’s right to the truth. Like the backward facing “covet” law #10…each is a perspective on the others
Jm 2:10 keep the whole law but break one point = guilty of breaking the whole! (which brings up another important point…)
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Law is understood in the context of the WHOLE of SCRIPTURE: OT and NT
and the Scriptures are fairly “law-positive” The law is wholly good
OT: Neh 9:13 "Then You came down on Mount Sinai, And spoke with them from heaven; You gave to them just ordinances and true laws, Good statutes and commandments.
NT: Rom 7:12 the Law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
IF … 1 Tim 1:8 … if used lawfully…so how do we use it lawfully
So how is it used lawfully?
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Law is understood in the context of the WHOLE PERSON in HOW it addresses us …YOU … the WHOLE PERSON
Not primarily about external conformity,
Author AJ Jacobs found this out … The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible
Says he’s about as Jewish as the Olive Garden is an Italian Restaurant Secular upbringing; wondering what he was missing without spirituality in his life
As a writer living in NY, the hardest laws: no coveting, lying, gossiping Good news: He’s cut down his lies by 40% after the project
In Central Park, was able to stone an adulterer … using pebbles b/c the bible doesn’t say the size of the stone that needs to be used
Result: While it was a harder way to live, it was also very freeing was not simply all about guilt and sin brought a sense of thankfulness and joy
he’s is now a reverent agnostic
The law addresses ACTION … and AFFECTION, it addresses the HEART
This is b/c the law is spiritual (Rom 7:14)
You see Jesus constantly pushing the idea that the law is more than skin deep
Mt 5-7 (greatest commentary on the 10 Cs) brings everything back to the heart. Murder isn’t the end of life, but the beginning of anger The path to adultery doesn’t begin at the doorway to the bedroom, But in the corridors of the heart
Mk 10:17ff… “I have kept the entire law” Then, there is only one thing lacking … the MAIN THING Understanding that you haven’t!!!!
Mark 7:21-22 For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness.
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So how is the law used lawfully?
The three purposes of the Law
1. Shows us our sin and serves to restrain it (REVEALS and RESTRAINS)
Invisible Fence in our yard, zone immediately prior to getting shocked is marked visually by little white flags and audibly by a beeping of the color. They REVEAL a boundary. And if you cross that boundary….SHOCK
This is the real reason why we post the 10Cs at the courthouse and just outside the principal’s office at school … you’re gonna get spanked if you do that!!!!
Did the threat of a whoopin’ stop my whacky hijinx as a kid? It slowed it down… I sure didn’t want to get caught So I just got more crafty
The law shows our sin, and can deter sin and evil But the law is as powerless to STOP sin as that fence is to truly stop a dog
It’s the “Isle of Dr. Muroe” scenario “what is the law?” “no spill blood!” What happens if you break the law? “Back to the house of PAIN!”
Does that stop the animals from killing? NO!!!
Rom 7:7-8, 10-11… law provokes sin, it stirs it up And if sin is what is keeping us from God … what then
The law therefore CANNOT put us right with God Rom 3:20, 28; Gal 2:16 (2x) … by the law NO ONE will be justified, right with God
>>>>>>>>> 2. Brings us to the second purpose/use of the law…
The law is a mirror … no power to transform, but like a mirror, shows our ugliness
Donald Grey Barnhouse “Now the purpose of a mirror is to reveal to your that your face is dirty, but the purpose of a mirror is not to wash your face. The purpose of the mirror is to drive you to the water!”
The Law is a mirror to drive sinners to Christ!
The law shows me my sin, stirs up sin, and shows me that I cannot in any way live up to the good standards of a great God.
But it shows me one who has!
Shows us our Savior
John Bunyan says “If you do not understand the nature of the law you cannot not know the nature of sin. If you do not know the nature of sin, you cannot know the nature of the Savior.”
Acts 13.39 : freed thru Jesus, Law couldn’t free you
Scripture pictures the law as our guardian (paidagogos … Gal 3:23-26) Slave who would not only instruct the child, but make sure he did what he needed to do…super nanny
Read GAL 4:4-5
>>>>>>>>>>> We tend to think that keeping the law is what brings us to the Savior It’s not keeping the Law that brings us to Jesus…
It’s breaking the law that brings us to Jesus!
To have an appreciation of the law does not equal legalism
Not Moralism Distinguish between the Gospel and Legalism (Law-keeping) Gospel and Liberalism (Law-breaking)
The law has it’s limits
Rom 8:3-4 what the law could not do, weak as it was…Jesus did
It all points to Jesus, who (Mt 5:17) did not come to abolish the law or prophets, but fulfill them
Luke 24:27 And beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures.
The whole of the law, bound up in One Person: Jesus! So what now?
Being now secure in our relationship with God, we look to the law…
Shows us our STANDARD
3. A guide for living a life of faith to God’s glory (map)
Primary Use: The law is for those who have already been delivered Saved by grace to freely live for God, to God
Rom 6:17 obedient from the heart God desires obedience, he just abhors the outward show without the inward reality!
obedience is a RESPONSE to God’s love
His “hesed” = covenant loyalty, faithfulness
NOT a means to the end of God’s love But God’s love in Christ puts an end to us trying to obey to earn his love
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And that’s where the 10 Cs begin They DO NOT begin with the law but with the gospel, with God’s delivering love:
“Who delivered you out of Egypt, out of slavery”
God’s love for us is the foundation of the law
Mt 22:36-40 … Jesus re-its Dt 6:4-6, the Shema Which itself is a summary of Dt 5 re-it of the 10 Cs
Love and law are not mutually exclusive What is the summary of the Commands: LOVE Love the Lord your God and love your neighbor as yourself That’s the Law summed up: LOVE
Jesus loves you to death. Jesus gave himself for you, to free you FROM that which would kill you to free you TO that which you could not live out
Tim Keller: love is the greatest freedom loss of all
Why? You have to lose independence to gain intimacy If you want to benefits of love, it will cost you your independence